Should Sacramento REALTORS Work During the Holidays?

What some Sacramento REALTORS may forget over the holidays is the fact we owe a duty to our clients — and, by extension, to our fellow real estate agents — to communicate and respond. We ought not completely shut down, pull in the shingle and lock the door without giving people someplace else to go. But some agents glob onto the catch phrase: family comes first, which to them means disregard everything else around them. It doesn’t mean ignore business and not work at all over the holidays. It’s a little weird anyway that in our popular culture people have to remind themselves they have a family. Like an excuse.

If an agent doesn’t want to work during the holidays or bother with talking to clients or handling real estate documents, then an agent should find another agent who does. Then, there are those of us pass on some of our business to other agents but continue to communicate via email or text. Some of us have assistants who work overtime and their fingers to the bloody bone. But we don’t put up a “gone fishin'” sign and split.

I don’t know why I bother to gripe about agents who don’t work during the holidays except that it’s beats griping about my aching calves from hiking up Bald Mountain over the weekend. I’m walking around like the penguin on Gotham. It’s annoying to repeatedly call, text and email an agent and not get a response. It’s unprofessional behavior from agents as well to treat each other this way. And it begins around Thanksgiving every year.

It’s as though agents mentally sign off for the year. No point to work during the holidays, they say. We might receive a purchase offer but the agent may fail to respond to a counter offer. It’s like some agents drop off the face of the earth. They can’t even manage to check email once a day. Which means we’re left holding the bag, apologizing to our clients for their behavior.

On the other hand, several agents followed up on their promises this Thanksgiving, which makes me doubly appreciative of their efforts, especially by comparison. I received an offer on Friday, which my sellers accepted. Everybody else was probably pooped out shopping during Black Friday when they could have instead gone online and bought a lovely holiday gift from Cards Against Humanity, all boxed up and appropriately titled for six bucks.

Now, maybe today, if I’m especially lucky, and I generally am, we’ll get the offer we’ve been waiting for since last Tuesday. It might be expired by the time it lands into my hands, but I swear I will keep my lips zipped and focus on the bright side.

Photo: Highway 128 into Winters from Sonoma, Thanksgiving 2014.